Geraint Thomas Wins 2018 Tour de France!

Alexander Kristoff won the 21st and final stage in Paris, but the overall victory goes to Thomas.

AFP/Bicycling.com |
30 July 2018

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Geraint Thomas won the 2018 Tour de France on Sunday, wrapping up the biggest victory of his career so far while Alexander Kristoff won the race’s 21st and final stage in Paris.

Thomas took the overall leader’s yellow jersey after winning Stage 11 and never let it go, adding to his lead over three days in the Pyrenees and holding off challenges from Sunweb’s Tom Dumoulin, who ultimately took second place overall, and his Sky teammate Chris Froome, who finished third overall.

At the end of the Tour, Thomas led Dumoulin by 1:51 and Froome by 2:24. The 32-year-old will be the first Welshman to ever stand atop the Tour de France podium. But his victory is the sixth in seven years for Team Sky, who first won with Bradley Wiggins in 2012 and with Froome in 2013, 2015, 2016, and 2017.

After a largely ceremonial stage in and around Paris, riders crossed the finish line on the Champs-Élysées and began the first of eight laps around a 7K circuit between the Arc de Triomphe and the Jardin des Tuileries. That’s when the last racing of this year’s Tour really began.

Getty Images Tim de Waele

A six-man breakaway was reeled on the final lap, and the sprinters’ teams upped the pace to chase down a last-ditch attack by Belgian champion Yves Lampaert. A group caught him only 220 meters from the line, and from there Kristoff came off the wheel to surge to the finish. He narrowly beat out John Degenkolb and Stage 18 winner Arnaud Démare in the final bunch sprint.

But Thomas, his victory secured, sipped champagne and joked with his teammates as he finished comfortably with the peloton a few seconds later, taking his first-ever Tour de France title.